Recap: Kamen Rider Gotchard, Episode 9 – Dash to Kyoto! School Trip!

Minato-sensei tells Houtarou’s normal person class that they’ll have a class trip to Kyoto next week! But they have to group up and decide on a topic they’ll be researching and doing a presentation on. Houtarou is excited to experience the dreamy romance of Kyoto and excitedly runs over to Rinne who isn’t too eager to team up with him even though she doesn’t have a group yet. Ryo excitedly comes over and says he’s already chosen to focus on supernatural happenings in Kyoto.

That night, news travels about UFO sightings in Kyoto. Ryo excitedly heads over to Restaurant Ichinose to tell an already excited Houtarou about it.

Next day, Spanner is out investigating the Sisters when Lachesis appears and they battle. Lachesis points out that humans can only absorb one Chemy, but she can absorb several to become an even more powerful Malgam.

Spanner is impressed. He uses Gekiocopter and Gutsshovel Cards to uphenshin and Lachesis is impressed by that as well. Spanner demands she tell him what they are planning, but she calls him a dog that should kneel at her feet and leaves.

Spanner picks something up a piece of the defeated Dragonfly Malgam and says it will be Lachesis who will fall to her knees.

Lachesis heads back to the lair where Atropos says Clotho is out catching a Level 10. In the meantime, they must continue on with their plan. Lachesis takes the other half of the Dragonfly Malgam and places it in a boiling beaker. The liquid from several beakers fuse into what looks like a Driver.

Meanwhile, Houtarou and friends arrive in Kyoto. Rinne asks why he seems so down after having been so excited about the trip. But Houtarou says he feels bad about leaving Hopper1 behind. Rinne says he could’ve brought it if he put it on the Card. Houtarou says not to be so absurd. This is a school trip!

Anyway, Clotho is standing atop Kyoto Tower and wonders whether she should finish off Houtarou before catching the Level 10 Malgam.

Clotho focuses on the police van that is carrying two criminals. She likes their criminal attitudes and fuses the Junglejan Chemy with one of the men to turn it into Jungle Malgam. The other, hooded man lets out a creepy grin and walks away.

Houtarou, Rinne and Ryo head to the temple from which the UFO was sighted. Rinne notices something moving in Houtarou’s bag and turns out Hopper1 stowed away in it. Hopper1 jumps out and seems to take a liking to Ryo, but refuses to be photographed and hops away.

Ryo chases after Hopper1 which leads him to meeting Himeno Hijiri who shares an interest in the paranormal. Both actually had articles published in the Chojo Wakusei magazine and recognize each other’s names.

Houtarou watches them from behind the tree and is happy to see Ryo and Hijiri getting along very well. Rinne comes over to ask what’s the hold up and Hopper1 pops up and hops onto Houtarou’s back.

Ryo asks where Hijiri works and she says she works at Toei Kyoto Studio Park. Ryo convinces Houtarou and Rinne to head over. Rinne points out their topic was UFOs, but Ryo can’t let this opportunity pass him by. Houtarou excitedly helps his friend pursue his Gotcha and asks Rinne to help with this romantic Kyoto dream.

They run all over the park and end up in a haunted house. Houtarou and Ryo are scared to death which amuses Rinne very much.

Turns out Hijiri actually works as a ghost and is happy to see Ryo here. She tells him to meet her at Togetsukyo Bridge in an hour after she gets off work.

Ryo hurries off to the bridge to wait.

Minato-sensei comes to tell Houtarou and Rinne about Clotho having been spotted in Kyoto. So they must be ready for when she might attack. Rinne realizes Houtarou left the Cards back home.

Houtarou calls Ringe and Sabimaru to ask if they can bring the Cards over. And Ringe enthusiastically grabs Sabimaru to hop on Golddash and they hurry to Kyoto.

Over at Togetsukyo Bridge, Hijiri arrives and meets with Ryo. They go for some tea to talk about their experiences of experiencing the paranormal when they were children. Ryo saw a UFO, but no one believed him. It was then when he became interested in the topic.

Hijiri recounts how she saw her parents’ souls when her brother brought her to the cemetery after they died. She believes that there is a world adjacent to theirs. And that’s why she started working at the haunted house where she and brother visited as children.

Just then, Hijiri gets a text from someone who says they should meet since they haven’t seen each other in a long time. She quickly excuses herself and says “See ya later” to Ryo.

Ryo follows Hijiri and is shocked when the person she has gone to meet is a handsome man. She runs to give him a big hug. Ryo is heartbroken.

The man hugs Hijiri back. But he curiously has handcuffs on.

At the park, Minato-sensei finds Clotho and uses his alchemy to turn the ninja mannequins into real people in order to take her on. But Clotho has no problem taking care of them.

Elsewhere, Houtarou and Rinne are taking Instagram photos in period clothes. Houtarou thinks they don’t have time to be fooling around. Rinne is annoyed since she had wanted to visit places related to the Shinsengumi in the first place.

Suddenly, Hopper1 alerts them to Minato-sensei and Clotho’s fight. They hurry over. But Clotho orders the Jungle Malgam to get violent and take care of them. Houtarou cannot henshin, however, since he doesn’t have his Cards.

The Malgam embiggens and begins rampaging across Kyoto. Rinne tosses Houtarou the Renkingrobo and Yamibat Cards to at least allow him to henshin into a form that will allow him to fight.

Houtarou becomes the big BatKingRobo and battles the Malgam in front of all of Kyoto’s iconic landmarks.

Rinne helps Houtarou by using alchemy to get him flying while he is wrapped in the Malgam’s vines. That knocks the Malgam off his feat and Houtarou is able to use Gotchard Beam. But quickly loses power and is forced to dehenshin.

The Malgam steps on Houtarou. But Ringe and Sabimaru arrive and toss him the Steamliner Card allowing Houtarou to henshin.

Episode Thoughts

A full, exciting episode! Lots happening of course. But I think it worked even better as a promo video for Kyoto tourism! Hehe.

When my family was planning our 2020 Japan trip (which we obviously weren’t able to eventually go on), I definitely had Toei’s Kyoto Studio Park on the itinerary. As well as all the beautiful spots in Kyoto, some of which this episode featured in a fun way. Hopefully one day! 🙏

But anyway a good episode that moved a lot of stories forward.

First, I think we got the most of the Sisters since the first episode. They’re definitely working on something. They’re not just some moustache-twirling villains sitting in some dark room. They’re taking action and making moves. It’s good to see and definitely building up to whatever will be the result of their plan.

I also liked the little battle between Lachesis and Supana. Really hope that will be a long simmering rivalry.

(Also, I just learned that the official spelling of Spanner is “Supana” and I don’t know if I want to use it lololololol)

Meanwhile, we get some more of excitable Houtarou after a few weeks of a more serious and calm Mr. Ichinose. And it was fun. I think it is a perfect contrast to Rinne’s personality. But at the same time, neither of them are completely locked into some box that they can never get out of.

Like with Rinne, we saw her laughing at Houtarou and Ryo in the haunted house and enjoying it. And she’s isn’t completely closed off to Houtarou or other people either. With Houtarou, he’s really more like a typical teenager. He wants to have fun, he’s also a hopeless romantic, he’s friendly and he has a good sense of justice and responsibility too. We see that even in the short time we’ve spent with him so far.

So it’s a good dynamic between them. And a good dynamic between them and the alchemy world as well.

Speaking of, great to see more of Minato-sensei. Would love to see him more in action too.

And using Ryo in a consequential way instead of being some comic relief side character that the show uses to throw in a joke or two is great. Really like the relationship they set up between Ryo and Hiriji. I hope she isn’t some simple guest star.

But I will assume the guy Hiriji met is her older brother. And it took me a minute to realize he was the hooded man from the police van. So that’s definitely an intriguing new mystery to unfold in the next episode! I assume he’s not going to be some guest character, but actually will have a big part? (Don’t tell me! hehe)

Using Ryo as sort of an example of how the alchemy world affects the “normal” world is really good also. Especially because of Ryo’s friendship with Houtarou too.

Overall, another great episode. Definitely reminded me how much I want to visit Kyoto. But also a really full episode that moves both our characters and story along in a good way.

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